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Tracking progress for uncluttering and organizing motivation

After my accident last year, the one where I tore all the muscles off the bones in my foot, my podiatrist banned me from running for months. I had been training to run the Cherry Blossom 10-Mile Race, and being told I couldn’t run was frustrating. I spent a lot of time grumbling to myself as I hobbled around the house in my cast.

The months passed, my cast went away, I did some low-impact physical therapy, and eventually got the go-ahead to start exercising again from my doctor. I took a few more months off for good measure (a.k.a. laziness), but finally returned to the gym when the weather got cooler. In addition to the accident, being away from running for close to a year took its toll on my body. I went from running 10 miles in 1 hour and 17 minutes to jogging-walking 10 miles in 2 hours and 32 minutes.

Over the past couple weeks, my time has been improving, but it is slow going (very, very slow going). One thing I’ve started doing again is tracking my distances and times to see my progression. Since my improvement is so gradual, it would be easy to miss what little advancements I’m making. I won’t be winning any races in the near future (if ever, I’m not yet certain how my injury will affect me over the longterm), but I like seeing the charts showing I’m at least not getting slower.

Tracking your progress isn’t a new concept, and it’s certainly not limited to showing running time improvements. A number of us have to do it for work, to learn if certain endeavors are beneficial to our goals. We took tests in school to determine what information we had acquired over the course of a unit of study. Some people track their gas mileage to see what they can do to improve their fuel efficiency. The systems we use to track our progress also don’t need to be new — your eyes, a digital camera, a pad of paper, a writing utensil, and maybe a program on your computer or application on your phone.

If you’re looking for motivation to keep you working on an uncluttering and organizing project, consider tracking your projects. I’ve found it to be easily done and very rewarding. You take a picture of an area in its cluttered and disorganized state and this image allows you to see how much you improve an area over time. This is an especially good idea if you’re doing only a small piece of the project each day. Keeping a journal or a list of notes about work you do in an area of your home or office can have the same impact. It’s easy to forget where you started when you don’t have a reference point, so keeping track of your work is great motivation to keep you going.

I don’t know why, but when you know you’re keeping track of your uncluttering and organizing, you feel motivated to work on the project. You develop a desire to see the “before” and “after” images side-by-side, with a drastic difference between the two.

Have you ever considered tracking your uncluttering and organizing projects? Did you benefit from seeing how you progressed over time? Share your experiences in the comments.

Posted by Erin on Feb 9, 2012 | 17 Comments | Tweet This

Knowing your strengths and weaknesses can improve your uncluttering and organizing projects

We write a great deal on this site about how knowing what you really need can help you unclutter and organize. Do you like to have paper and pens next to you while you work on the computer? Do you access your hole punch five times a day? Do you like to have music on while you fold the laundry? If so, you should have these tools in places you can easily reach while you work on these tasks. Get rid of the things you don’t need, and have available the things you do.

In addition to knowing what tools you need, though, it’s also a good idea to know your personal strengths and weaknesses when it comes to uncluttering and organizing. Are you good at putting items away after you use them? Are you spontaneous or procedural? Do you work better on your own or in groups? When you’re honest with yourself about the things you do well — and not so well — you can be more successful with your uncluttering and organizing efforts.

One of my strengths is I don’t ever get caught up in the “what if” line of thinking. When I look at small slivers of wrapping paper or fabric remnants or empty yogurt containers, I don’t hesitate to recycle these types of things. Conversely, one of my weaknesses is I don’t ever get caught up in the “what if” line of thinking. I have great difficulty imagining how to re-purpose objects. An empty paint can is always an empty paint can to me, it’s not a pen holder or a bin for small toys or a bucket to use to clean paint brushes. As a result, I’ve learned to let my husband look over items I plan to donate to charity or recycle before making final decisions about them. He’s a level-headed guy who usually agrees with my decisions but has rescued a few important objects from my purge piles over the years.

The following list is far from complete, but my hope is that it can get you to think about your strengths and weaknesses so that both can work in your favor when taking on uncluttering and organizing projects:

Strength — Idea Generation. In your family or when working in groups at the office, lead the organizing solutions aspects of the project. Research and dream up ways to store the items you decide to keep in ways that best suit all of the people who will access the space and/or items.
Weakness — Not Good with Follow Through. If putting things back where they belong is difficult for you, consider having storage space for an item you regularly use in many different rooms. For example, if you take off your shoes sometimes in the living room or by the front door or in your bedroom, have bins to hold your shoes in all three spaces. You’ll easily be able to find your shoes in one of the three bins, and your shoes won’t be cluttering up three rooms.
Strength — Motivation. If you’re good at motivating others, use these same skills to motivate yourself and other people on an uncluttering and organizing project. Don’t announce that you’ll be the official cheerleader, simply do what you do best. Play music, get everyone and yourself laughing, and make the most of the situation.
Weakness — Wandering Mind and Feet. Work with a buddy when uncluttering and organizing. This person doesn’t need to participate in the process directly, he or she only needs to be in the same room to talk with you and help keep you on task. I like to refer to this person as an accountability partner.
Strength — Noticing Patterns. I often refer to this skill as a super power. People who are good at noticing patterns are great at sorting papers, filtering out duplicate items, and grouping like objects with like objects. If this is your strength, roll up your sleeves and let your organizing skills shine. If working in a group, help teach others how you quickly and efficiently make sense of the information you’re processing.

What do you do well? What don’t you do well? How can you get your strengths and weaknesses to help you succeed with your uncluttering and organizing projects?

Posted by Erin on Feb 6, 2012 | 28 Comments | Tweet This

Dinner organizing advice from 10 large families

Getting a nutritious, warm meal on the table each night for dinner can be stressful. Even though I plan our meals each week, I still look for ways to make the process easier and run more smoothly. For advice on how to reduce the stress, I decided to interview large families to see how they manage the chaos and keep their families full.

The families: I interviewed 10 families with three or more children. Four of the families have three children, three of the families have four children, two have six children, and one has eight children. Ages range from two weeks old to seniors in high school, but all the families have at least one or more children in elementary school. In half the families, both parents work or are in school full time. In the other half, the father has a full-time job outside the home and the mother manages the business of the house. These families live all across the U.S. and they are all two-parent families.

The interviews were surprising in many ways, but what caught me off guard was how often I heard similar responses. I was not expecting there to be as many trends in the answers as there were. There seems to be an art to feeding large families, and all of the families I interviewed are accomplished artists. The biggest trend I found is that mealtime is a focus of the day for these families and dinner is not something these families just want to get through. Dinner is a valued destination and is the one time each day when these families come together as a unit.

Trends

Eat together. In 8 of the 10 responses, the entire family eats together at the dining table at least six nights a week. In one family, dinner is at 4:00 p.m. so the family can eat together before the kids go off to practices and lessons. The father of this family goes to work at 6:00 in the morning so he can be home by 4:00 for the family meal. Another family gives kids high-protein snacks after school to keep them from attacking each other before dinnertime at 7:00 p.m., when everyone is finally home from work and after-school activities. Irrespective of when they eat, these families place a high priority on dinners together. Most sit down to dinner around 5:00 p.m. Six of the families reported sharing breakfast together, too.
Eat at home. The children eat at home, and they eat food made at home. One family said they do pizza delivery six times a year for their kids, but that was the only mention of restaurants in the entire survey.
Weekly meal planning. All families reported doing some type of meal planning. Whether it means they plan meals based on what the local butcher and stores have on sale (almost all subscribe to the weekend paper to get coupons and sale announcements), build meals on what the CSA delivers or what is in ample supply at the farmers market, scribble meal ideas on the back of grocery lists, or use a formal meal-planning chart — they rarely fly blind. None of the families do monthly meal planning.
Prepare ahead. The majority of respondents said that some meal preparation is completed earlier in the day. Vegetables might be chopped or casseroles are assembled or items are put in the slow cooker or meat is defrosted hours before dinnertime (usually while preparing breakfast). In three families, fathers make their lunches and their children’s lunches for the next day while the rest of the family cleans up after dinner.
Shopping at more than one location. Not only did families report wanting to get the best deals, but they also want to get the best food for their dollars. Almost all families reported to buying only hormone-and-antibiotic-free meat (when they eat meat), relying on farmers markets for produce during the summer, and eating as little commercially packaged food as possible. This meant that grocery shopping didn’t happen in one weekly trip to one store, but to many locations to get exactly what they want. All families reported that the majority of shopping is done on the same day each week, but that one or two “quick trips” are made to pick up additional items later in the week.
Very little meat. More than half of the families said they only eat meat a couple times a week. Although cost might be part of the reasoning for this decision, health concerns and freezer space were the reported motivations. None of the families interviewed is strictly vegetarian.
Everyone eats the same meal. None of the families make entirely separate meals for picky eaters. A few families said they make extra portions of favorite foods for picky eaters that they freeze so if one food at a meal is refused, there is an alternative on hand. However, the child is responsible for heating up this side dish on her own and can only do so if the leftover is available. In families with children with food allergies or intolerances, the whole family follows the special diet. One responder said she tries to incorporate two new main dishes into the meal plan each week. She does this to introduce her children to new foods and new flavors, but pairs the entrees with favorite side dishes in case the meal isn’t a hit.
Teaching opportunity. Seven of the families responded that mealtime is also a great time to teach life skills, like organizing. Their children are involved in cooking, planning, cleaning, and even creating a food budget and shopping. One mother occasionally changes the serving sizes on recipes to have her kids work the math problems.
Divide responsibilities. Again, 8 of the 10 families reported that all family members help in the mealtime process. A young child sets the table, an older one slices vegetables, a third child grates cheese, one sweeps the floor after dinner, one rinses the dishes, dad loads the dishwasher, etc. In only one family do children sit and do their homework while mom and dad prepare the meal. In this family, the children are responsible for cleaning up, however.
The head chef. Mom is usually in the role of head chef, but sometimes it is dad and sometimes it is an older child. Irrespective of who it is, the head chef is responsible for coordinating what responsibilities each person in the family has for that night’s dinner. This coordinator doesn’t do all the work, but rather makes sure all the work surrounding mealtime is completed. One family explained the head chef’s role as being similar to a conductor’s role in an orchestra. Who will be head chef for a night is determined during the meal planning stage.

Additional advice

One family doesn’t use formal serving dishes, just puts the pots and pans right on the table, to save on dishwashing later.
Once a week, one family eats off china dishes and pretends to be dining in a fine restaurant, complete with dress code. This isn’t really organizing related, but I found it interesting nonetheless.
In a family with six children, favorite meals are rotated into the plan at one a week, so it takes eight weeks but each family member gets their favorite meal six times a year. Favorite meals are tracked on the central family calendar.
One family makes double portions and freezes half for a meal they’ll eat in a week or two.
Surprisingly, the only two families that relied on make-ahead services like Dream Dinners were the two families that eat in shifts and not together. Both of these families also only have three children. My guess is that price is a factor in using these services, and that they are too expensive for very large families to use on a regular basis.
One mother writes what the family had for dinner on a family calendar and then reviews the calendar when meal planning to make sure one food doesn’t get into heavy rotation.
One family has a no complaining rule and anyone who complains about the meal has to wash all the dishes by hand even though they have a dishwasher. Again, this isn’t really organizing related, but I thought it was a fun rule.
Only one responder mentioned making dessert each night. Dessert doesn’t seem to be a regular part of large family meals, at least for the families I interviewed.
I didn’t ask this question, but six families reported mom and dad go out on a date night on the same night each week. On these nights, the children still typically eat a meal prepared at home, but they eat together with a sitter or grandparent.

The responder with eight children (her oldest is only 12) summed up her mealtime perspective with a nice catch phrase: “Keep the majors major and the minors minor.” For her, the major is sitting down to a meal with her family each night. The minors are missed ingredients and foods that didn’t turn out exactly right. I believe this perspective and the insights listed above can help all of us, regardless of family size, to reduce the stress surrounding mealtime.

Posted by Erin on Jan 31, 2012 | 51 Comments | Tweet This

Single socks and how they can help you learn to process what-if clutter

It is rare for all our socks to have mates after we finish folding the laundry. Sometimes a sock will hide inside a fitted sheet and we won’t notice it during folding, but we discover the errant sock when we put the sheet on the bed a few days later. Other times, a sock will have been stuck inside a shirt sleeve or a pant leg. Rarely is the missing sock lost forever, though, so we keep a small basket in the laundry room for single socks and when the mate shows up we immediately know where to find its match.

Even though mates are usually found, invariably one sock will hang out in the lost-mate basket for many months, its mate gone forever. (After seeing Gnomeo and Juliet, I’ve been blaming lawn gnomes for this phenomenon.) If a sock hangs out in the lost-sock basket for more than three months, the sock is moved to the rag pile and recycled for dusting.

I explained our lost-sock basket to a room full of people at a conference recently, and a woman raised her hand and asked, “But what if you find the other sock after you start using its mate as a rag?”

I replied, “It has only happened once, and we just made the newly found sock into a rag, too.”

The woman then let out an audible gasp, almost as if my suggestion had caused her physical pain. My guess is that, like many people, she struggles with making decisions about “what if” items, and these “what if” objects likely cause her difficulty when dealing with clutter.

What if I get rid of this empty yogurt tub and then someone comes over for dinner and I want to send her home with leftovers?

What if I get rid of this piece of wood and then two months from now I need to fix something and this exact piece of wood would have been the perfect solution?

What if I give this coat to charity and then wish I hadn’t?

If you’re someone who regularly plays the “what if” scenario in your mind, try giving this simple lost-sock basket a try in your home. Recycle any sock that remains in the basket for more than three months. Since you know the worst that can happen is you might end up recycling two socks, it’s a relative inexpensive way to practice making these types of uncluttering decisions. You don’t need a single sock hanging around your house for years waiting for a mate.

The more practice you get, the easier it will become to part with things that you do not need that are cluttering up your space. You learn to trust that even if you end up needing an item that you purged that you will be able to buy a replacement or borrow one from a family member or that you will be creative enough to find an alternate solution.

And, if you do find the lost sock in less than three months, you’ll at least know quickly where to find its mate.

Posted by Erin on Jan 30, 2012 | 65 Comments | Tweet This

Stop overlooking the perpetually out-of-place stuff

Objects can easily go on walkabout and then hang out, as if on vacation, in whatever random location you left them. If this happens to you (like it does me from time-to-time), try these five strategies to help you to see and deal with the perpetually out-of-place stuff in your home and office:

Take photographs of all areas of a room and then look intently at the pictures. I’m not sure how it works, but analyzing an image can often help you see clutter you’ve become blind to in person. Dust bunnies under your monitor, stray toys under your dining room buffet, junk mail on your fireplace mantel jump out in photos but blend into the woodwork in person.
Invite people over to your house for a party. Again, I’m not sure how it works, but having non-immediate family in your home can often make you to see clutter you had been previously immune to in your space.
Become a stray stuff collector. Grab an empty laundry basket and see how many stray objects you can find in a room. Record the number, and then repeat the process in exactly one week. Do this task weekly in a room until the number regularly falls below two stray objects. Then, repeat the process in another room.
Notice repeat offenders. If you are constantly finding the same object out of place, you may have the “wrong” storage space for the object. Would you be able to store the object in a more convenient location so that it’s not constantly cluttering up a room?
A place for everything. Be sure everything you own has a permanent storage space. If it doesn’t, the object will always be out of place. This means you should have a permanent home for stamps, rubber bands, paper clips, spare change, bills, gift cards, medicine, etc.

How do you deal with perpetually out-of-place stuff in your spaces? Share your strategies — and your struggles — in the comments.

Posted by Erin on Jan 24, 2012 | 24 Comments | Tweet This

Cabin fever? Organize your summer travel plans now

At least for those of us in the northern hemisphere, January is a great time to make summer travel plans. You are able to beat the rush and still get some good deals on popular travel destinations, as well as you are able to think about things other than the cold and wind and snow currently going on outside. It’s also a good time to curl up under a warm blanket with a cup of hot chocolate and thumb through travel magazines or travel guides to learn as much as you can about the place (or places) you want to go.

When planning a trip, it’s best to start by analyzing your budget. How much do you already have saved? How much can you save before deposits and tickets need to be made or purchased? How much can you save before the actual date of travel?

Once you know how much you will be able to save for your vacation, you can narrow down the locations of where you wish to go, how you wish to get there, where you will stay while there, and what you wish to do when you’re there. Or, as you probably refer to it as, an Expense Budget. As you’re writing down your expenses, don’t forget that you may need to purchase a few special items before your trip — a new swimsuit or larger memory card for your digital camera or a travel jacket — and you’ll also need to eat while you’re on the road. If you’re someone who buys a trinket or two while traveling, budget for these expenses, too.

WiseBread.com has a terrific round-up of travel websites that can help you to save money, “40 Most Useful Travel Websites That Can Save You a Fortune.” The article is a few years old, but most of the websites are still in business. When making your plans, you want to be sure to get the best deal possible so you aren’t wasting any of that money you so diligently saved.

With the money part of the equation settled, turn to the internet and/or your travel guides for itinerary inspiration. Save articles to Instapaper or Evernote. Pictures of destinations can be pinned to Pinterest. Maps, hotel reservation numbers, flight plans, car rental receipts can also be saved to Evernote. Services like TripIt work, too. If you are traveling outside the U.S., you may want to keep a file folder of this information to carry with you, especially if you don’t plan to have an international data plan for your smart phone when you’re overseas.

As the months pass and you get closer to your time of travel, check out travel expert Chris Guillebeau’s article “Stress, stuff, and world travel.” It’s crammed with extremely useful information for jet-setting in an uncluttered fashion.

Posted by Erin on Jan 23, 2012 | 4 Comments | Tweet This

Clear the clutter, build a fort

Pillows, blankets, stacks of books, and dining room chairs are currently the decorations of choice in our living room. My son is going through a fort building stage and we’re lucky we’ve been able to contain it to the living room. If he had his druthers, we would also have fort kitchen, fort bathroom, fort laundry room, and fort front yard.

I loved building forts as a kid, and I am very glad my son has an interest in it, too. My son’s favorite part of fort building is knocking down sections of the fort to do renovation work. A room might have been too small or maybe it had a window he didn’t like or the roof was too saggy. Once the room is down, he declares it to be broken and then begins the rebuilding process. After a room is finished, the whole family is invited to visit the new space, where we discuss the renovation and how it is preferable to its earlier condition and then play drums and harmonicas or pretend to take naps (fort construction is hard work).

My son’s obsession with forts has reminded me how truly simple it can be to pursue the life you desire. My son likes building forts, so he builds forts. He doesn’t talk about building forts or wish he were building forts or make excuses for why he can’t build forts, he simply builds forts. When he is tired of fort building, he will play with trains because he wants to play with trains or whatever interest is next on his agenda. Unless I tell him he can’t do something because it’s unsafe (like building a fort inside the stove), he’ll do whatever it is he wants to do.

Unlike toddlers, as we grow older and mature, we take on more responsibilities, allow unwanted things to come into our life, and living the life of our dreams becomes more difficult. We are easily distracted by things that don’t really matter to us. We also let doubts and worry and negative messages invade our brains so that we stop doing the things we really want to do. Clutter comes in and prevents us from building forts (or whatever it is you enjoy doing).

I’m not suggesting it’s bad that you are responsible for the people and things in your life. Those of us who aren’t insanely wealthy have to work to pay bills and provide for ourselves and our families. Rather, I’m suggesting you get rid of all of the stuff that doesn’t matter. Get rid of the clutter (extraneous physical stuff, negative thoughts, bad relationships, commitments that don’t interest you) so you can have time, energy, and resources to use on what matters to you. If you want to spend more quality time with your family, unclutter the distractions and start spending more quality time with your family. Embrace your inner toddler, and simply do it.

Identify what matters most to you, identify the distractions that are keeping you from the things that matter, and do your best to remove the clutter so you can pursue the life you desire. Life is too short — even if you live to be 102 — not to build forts or laugh with your children or catch up with a dear friend or volunteer at your favorite charity or lend your neighbor a hand in a time of need or meditate or go on an adventure.

Posted by Erin on Jan 19, 2012 | 20 Comments | Tweet This

Four changes you can make to help you complete undesirable tasks

My mother-in-law recently gave me a pair of bright yellow rain boots. They are silly and funny and very good at keeping my feet dry. I cannot stop smiling when I wear them. And, now that I own them, I look forward to it raining. I actually cheered last night when the weatherman on the news said rain was in the forecast for today.

Most people don’t look forward to the rain because it slows down traffic and forces you to spend more time indoors than preferred. Before the boots, I felt this way, too. The rain was an inconvenience to me. However, one simple change — new yellow boots — and my entire perspective has been altered from negative to positive.

Along these lines, are there tasks in your work or home life you dislike completing and procrastinate doing? Could changing one thing associated with those tasks improve your perspective and help you to get the work done?

Appearance: If you dislike the look of something, you may not enjoy using the object. If your laundry room in your house is in a dark, concrete, unfinished basement, you might avoid doing the laundry because you don’t want to spend time in the space. A little paint on the walls, some vinyl flooring, new shelving, and improved lighting might be all you need to change to help you to keep current with this chore. Brightly colored file folders might help you to be interested in your filing. A sharp looking notepad or a new pen might help you to write down to-do reminders.
Timing: Changing when you do an activity can also improve your perspective about it. If you normally try to tackle an unpleasant task right before you leave work for the day, try moving it to right after lunch or first thing in the morning to see if it helps you to get it done. If you dislike the crowds at the grocery store on the weekends, make a routine of going shopping on Tuesday evenings.
Game On: For tasks I have to do that don’t take much time or mental power (like cleaning my desk or taking out the trash), I set a timer and see how quickly I can do them. I record the times and make notes about how I changed the task to make it more efficient. It sounds ridiculous, but the game of racing the clock and finding a more efficient way to do something is fun for me. Create a game you would enjoy, and it might help you to complete the undesirable task.
Linking Activities: Plain and simple, some tasks are just not enjoyable. However, there are things you can link to these unpleasant activities to improve the overall experience. If you dread going to the dentist, find a friend who goes to the same dentist and start making your appointments for regular cleanings back-to-back. You can catch up over breakfast before the appointments, chat in the waiting room, and console each other afterward. If you’re not fond of having to drive to a far-flung location for a meeting, find a restaurant or place you would enjoy visiting nearby, and then be sure to stop at the more interesting location when you’re done with your meeting. If you don’t enjoy returning phone calls, make sure the last call you return is to someone you really enjoy talking to.

What have you done to improve your perspective about a dreaded task and turn it into an activity you want to complete? What activities in your life could use a makeover? Share your strategies and struggles in the comments.

Posted by Erin on Jan 17, 2012 | 30 Comments | Tweet This

Unfinished business

The inbox on my desk is currently overflowing. I returned from traveling two weeks ago, dumped a stack of must-complete paperwork out of my briefcase and into the inbox, and immediately started to ignore the mess I’d made. The inbox ceased to be an inbox and became a Black Hole of Forgotten Items.

The situation with my inbox is similar to how most messes begin in our house and in my work. When a mess occurs it is usually because:

I’m in the process of doing something and am interrupted before I can finish the action. For example, I’ll be sorting through the mail, the phone will ring, I’ll set the mail down when I go to answer the phone, and a week later I’ll find a stack of old mail sitting in whatever strange location I dumped it.
I don’t take the time to do something properly because I don’t really want to work on the entire task. I’ll do the enjoyable or easy part (dump all the paperwork into the inbox), but stop short of taking care of the problem (processing the paperwork).
I start a task when it’s impossible to finish the task because of time limitations or situation. For example, I’ll check my voicemail when I’m sitting in the waiting room at the doctor’s office — I might be able to listen to one or two messages before the nurse calls me out of the waiting room, but I certainly don’t have time nor is it appropriate for me to return any of the calls right then.

Once a mess has started, I’ll either become immune to it (stepping over the unpacked luggage each time I go to the washing machine) or feel stress and anxiety about it (I have so much to do! Did I remember to write down that I have to call Margaret back?). My space is cluttered and my thoughts are often cluttered, too, simply because I didn’t finish what I had started.

Over the years, I’ve learned to deal with most of these messes before they happen. A few sneak up from time-to-time, as has happened with my inbox this January, but I tend to have fewer messes in my life because the mess never gets started. Here are many of the things I do to prevent the mess:

Limit interruptions. It is impossible to prevent all interruptions, but you can reduce them. Turn off the ringer on your phone or set it to “Do Not Disturb.” Turn off new message notification sounds on your computer and mobile devices. Put a sign on your office door or hang a sign in an obvious place of your cubical requesting that you not be disturbed except for emergencies for a limited time period. If corporate culture permits, wear earphones even if you aren’t listening to music. Hire a babysitter for a few hours to watch your children while you tackle a project that requires focus at home.
At work and at home, create standardized to-do lists and routines. In case you have to abandon a project, you’ll at least cycle back through it the following day and finish it then. Also, get in the habit of writing everything down in a central location — on your mobile phone or in a day planner or a notebook.
Before starting any important task, ask yourself, “Do I have enough time and is the situation appropriate for me to complete this task?” If you don’t have enough time to finish a project, ask yourself, “Do I at least have enough time to do what I can and clean up before moving onto something else and leave things so the project does get finished?” If you answer “no” to both these questions, don’t start working on something.
If you can do something right now, do it. When returning home from vacation, immediately unload your dirty clothes directly into the washing machine and unpack the rest of your luggage within minutes of walking in the door. If you can file a piece of paperwork as quickly as it would take you to drop it into your inbox, simply file the piece of paperwork.
Avoid having catch-all drawers, bins, and bags. If you’re going to need something from the catch-all container, it’s best to have the items organized in a way so that dumping all the contents onto the floor isn’t the easiest way to find something. Large toy chests are horrible because kids have to dump out all the toys to find the one item they want.
Create kits. Kits can sometimes lead to duplicate items (you may end up owning four pairs of scissors), but they’re extremely useful in that all of the things you need to accomplish a task are easily accessed and easily stored after use. Sewing kits, gift wrapping kits, scrapbooking kits, house-cleaning kits, car-cleaning kits, etc., make doing certain tasks more efficient and less messy.

What do you do to prevent messes from starting in your home and office? How do you always finish what you start? Share your strategies in the comments.

Posted by Erin on Jan 10, 2012 | 21 Comments | Tweet This

An unclutterer’s perspective

In Tuesday’s post, we discussed the seven routines and guidelines most unclutterers follow. These aren’t laws, they’re just actions that unclutterers often have in common. In a comparable vein, unclutterers seem to repeat similar statements about physical possessions.

The vast majority of unclutterers I know are not ascetics who eschew physical possessions or consumerism. There are a few minimalists in our ranks and some anti-consumers, but the majority of us like the conveniences of modern life, have some sentimental items in our homes, and think of ourselves as smart consumers — we spend less than we earn, research purchases before we make them, and mostly buy only things we need but with a few fun things thrown in to keep life interesting.

Not surprisingly, the statements that tend to unite unclutterers are straightforward and practical. Again, these aren’t laws, no one ceases to be an unclutterer if he or she doesn’t agree with one or more of these ideas. Rather, these are the eight concepts unclutterers often use when evaluating and discussing their stuff and their uncluttered and organized lives:

You are not your things. If your home were to burn down in a tragic accident, you wouldn’t stop being you. People would still recognize you in the office and in the grocery store. On a less dire level, if you part with an object, you’ll still be whole. The physical stuff in your life is not your life.
Physical possessions are not alive, they do not contain souls. Your grandmother is not inside the quilt/rocking chair/ring she gave you. Objects remind you of the person who gave them to you. Objects stir up sentimental memories associated with happy times. However, if you were to recycle a rusty and damaged knife your grandfather gave you, you would not be recycling your grandfather. If an object were accidentally destroyed, you would still have the joyful memories of the person and/or event associated with the object.
Know yourself, have less clutter. When you know who you are and what your priorities are in life, it’s easier to get rid of the things that don’t belong. It’s also easier to keep from acquiring things that distract you from what matters most to you. If you don’t know who you are and what matters to you, there will always be “what if” and “just in case” clutter in your life.
Read the manual. Knowing what you own and all of the things these items can do prevents owning items that have duplicate purposes. Obviously, this applies to electronic equipment, but it can also apply to low-tech equipment. A three-hour knife skills class can help you to know how to properly use knives so you no longer need extremely specific kitchen tools that do the same things knives can do.
Quality over quantity. Although this advice applies to purchases (a $50 toaster that lasts 50 years is a better deal than a $10 toaster that only lasts 5), it’s more about editing the things in your home. Instead of owning five pairs of pants you don’t like and don’t fit well, try owning two pairs that are the perfect fit and style. Instead of hoarding all your grandmother’s possessions in your garage, choose the one or two items that you truly value and use them in your home.
Anyone can learn to unclutter and be organized. As long as a person is in good mental and physical health, he or she can learn the skills to being uncluttered and organized. Everyone learns at a different rate — heck, I’m still learning — but everyone can learn. And, everyone should expect to have bumps in the road and failures as they learn, as this is part of the skills acquisition process.
Being an unclutterer is a choice, and it’s not for everyone. A person has to want to be an unclutterer to be one. You can’t force anyone against their will to adopt an uncluttered lifestyle. (You can teach them, talk with them, and show how it has improved your life, but that is where it ends.) More importantly, being an unclutterer isn’t for everyone. Uncluttered living is great, but there are multiple paths to living a remarkable life. Being intolerant of how other people have chosen to pursue what matters most to them only clutters up your time.
Uncluttered and organized is not the goal, it is a path to a better goal. What matters most to you are the goals; being uncluttered and organized merely allows you a smoother path to reach your other goals.

In addition to these common perspectives, individuals will have other ideas they bring to their uncluttered life. What perspectives do you hold that help you communicate with yourself and others about your uncluttering and organizing adventures?

Posted by Erin on Jan 5, 2012 | 33 Comments | Tweet This

Seven routines and guidelines to live as an unclutterer — no super powers necessary

You’re not a superhero? Well, neither am I. No unclutterer I know is a superhero, either. We’re all just non-superheroes doing our uncluttered, non-superhero things.

To an outsider, an unclutterer can appear to have super powers. But, trust me, unclutterers don’t have the ability to wave a magic wand and instantly be clutter free and organized (although, that would be an amazing power to possess). Instead of magic wands, most unclutterers simply do a little work each day and adhere to a few simple guidelines to keep from being overwhelmed by an avalanche of clutter.

These aren’t laws, but these are the routines and guidelines most unclutterers follow to keep clutter at bay:

Have a place for everything. If something you own doesn’t have a place to be stored, it will always be out of place and cluttering up your space. Everything needs a home that is easily accessible so you can find it when you need it.
When you’re finished using something, put it away. You can’t easily find something if it’s not in its proper storage location. Don’t waste time hunting for things, simply put items back when you’re finished using them. If you’re finished using something for good, put it in the trash, recycling, shredder, or donation bin.
The fewer things you own, the fewer things you have to store, maintain, put away, clean, etc. You don’t need to be a minimalist, just focus on getting rid of the clutter so you’re only caring for the things you value.
Only own things with utility and things that bring you happiness. Not everything in your home needs to be useful, but the things that aren’t useful need to at least make you happy. If you have a knickknack that you curse at every time you dust, it’s time for the knickknack to be passed along to someone else. If something that was once useful is no longer useful, it’s time to get rid of it, too.
One in, one out. If you buy a replacement good, get rid of the inferior good you’re replacing.
Everyone does his/her part. Everyone sharing your living space, including you, needs to lend a hand around the house out of respect for the others living in the space. Irrespective of how you choose to divvy up the major load of housework, everyone should: put away items after they use them, put their dirty clothes in the dirty clothes hamper, and clean up all messes he/she makes.
Do a little every day. When you do about 30 minutes of dedicated work on your home each day, you can pretty much cover everything you need to do over the course of a week. How to set up a daily routine is explained in the article, “Ask Unclutterer: Exhausted after work,” and also in more detail in my book, Unclutter Your Life in One Week.

You don’t need to be a superhero to follow these seven routines and guidelines. You, too, can be an unclutterer — no super powers necessary.

Posted by Erin on Jan 3, 2012 | 17 Comments | Tweet This

Get organized in January with these quick uncluttering and organizing tips

January is Get Organized Month, or what the organizing community refers to as GO Month. It’s the time of year when home and office organizing supplies typically go on sale at major retailers and when people start acting on their organizing-themed resolutions. It’s also the time of year when professional organizers tend to hold public events in their communities talking about organizing and uncluttering strategies. Check your local papers to see if any of these events will be held in your area.

When organizing, it’s best to unclutter first. Pull everything out of a space and sort it into piles: keep, purge, and other. Keep obviously means that you plan to continue to store and/or use the item. Purge can mean that you intend to trash, shred, recycle, or donate the item to charity. Your other pile is for objects that need to be repaired, relocated, returned to a friend or family member, or some other special action needs to be taken. Once all of the objects from the space have been sorted, you need to deal with the purge and other items immediately. If you don’t, they’re likely to cause you much frustration in the coming days. Trash what needs to be trashed, donate the objects that can be donated, return items to friends, and drop off objects that need to be repaired at the repair shop.

Once all the purge and other items are handled, take a look at all the objects you have in your keep pile. Do you need to do another round of uncluttering? If you’re feeling more courageous about purging items, now is the time to do it. When you are satisfied with your keep pile, sort the objects into new piles of like items — pencils with pencils, envelopes with envelopes, jeans with jeans. When everything is in piles by type, examine what you have and compare it to your storage systems. It is only at that this point that you should consider going out and buying organizing systems. Before you do, though, look through your house or office to see if you already own something that could hold and organize your objects. If you do, you don’t have any need to go out in the cold to buy anything.

If you decide to buy organizing products, check out the sales going on this January. The Container Store has a 30 percent off sale on all its Elfa closet organizers. Home Depot has all their storage and organizing items on sale through January 29, including their Martha Stewart line and many Rubbermaid products. And don’t forget to check out your local retailers that might also have sales on organizing items.

Before putting objects away, be sure to clean the space where the items will be stored. Wipe down shelves, replace shelf liner if needed, and vacuum out all the dust and spider webs. Repair or replace any storage items that are damaged, and make the storage area inviting. You are more likely to use a storage system if you like it.

As you’re putting items back into their newly cleaned storage spaces, be sure to put the items you access most often in the most convenient locations. Objects you access less often can go into the less convenient locations — and the heaviest of these objects should be stored lower to the ground so you don’t hurt yourself when you retrieve them. Put lids on things that aren’t accessed enough that they might collect dust, but keep objects you access regularly open to speed up retrieval time. Try not to stack anything more than three objects deep. Most importantly, know yourself. If you’re someone who has difficulty putting items back where they belong, make it as simple as possible to put items back in their places. A four-step return action will mean you probably won’t ever return the item back to where it belongs — one-step and two-step return actions are the easiest. Keep things simple.

What projects do you have planned for GO month? Share your plans in the comments.

Posted by Erin on Jan 2, 2012 | 11 Comments | Tweet This

Ask Unclutterer: How do you create resolutions when you’re coming up on a major life change?

Reader Amanda submitted the following to Ask Unclutterer:

How do you define goals or resolutions when you know your life is about to change dramatically? I am due with our firstborn, a son, in early 2012 (our due date is February 4th) … I don’t know how to plan my life around such a big addition. I would like to lose the baby weight (plus some), but I have no idea what that will look like with a baby in the mix. My friends and family are not goal-setters like I am, so I don’t know who to ask for help setting goals around the unknown. Any advice?

Congratulations on your upcoming new addition!

Since you enjoy setting goals and resolutions, I suggest you go ahead and make the ones you wish to make. You won’t stop being you when you become a parent (or when you experience any major life change), so go for it. Do some soul searching, make your lists, and create a 2012 Resolution Action Plan. Resolution enforcement police won’t come and arrest you if you don’t cross all your resolutions off your list by December 31, 2012. Worst case scenario, you won’t achieve any of your resolutions by the end of the year, and you’ll save yourself some time coming up with resolutions for 2013.

Plus, after your son is born and you become accustom to being a parent, you can always revise your resolutions. Think of it as a bonus opportunity — a goal-setter’s dream — to come up with a new plan in the middle of the year! Irrespective of parenting, anyone can revise resolutions and goals as necessary. Your 2012 Resolution Action Plan isn’t law, but rather a living document you can reassess as you wish.

The first two months of parenting, at least in my experience, are very similar to the first two months of a new dating relationship. You’re head-over-heels for this new person in your life and you withdraw from your friends and responsibilities for awhile while you get to know the new person. After two months, you start to enter back into a normal routine, but with this new person in the mix.

Since our son was healthy and a good sleeper, being a new parent was actually pretty easy until he learned to walk. I could strap him in a stroller and go for a run or put him in a carrier and go to the grocery store. When he started walking at 9-1/2 months is when life as a parent got more complicated for us. Luckily for you, most boys don’t walk until around their first birthday, so you could get 2-1/2 more months of the easy life than we did.

All this being said, every child is different and your son’s temperament, health, sleeping and eating patterns, and preferences will dictate how much time you can spend doing things not immediately related to caring for your son. Go ahead and make the resolutions, but don’t feel bad if you don’t achieve all of your goals by the end of 2012. You’ll at least have been loving and doting on your child instead, which is still a wonderful accomplishment.

Thank you, Amanda, for submitting your question for our Ask Unclutterer column. Once again, congratulations on your forthcoming adventure in parenting.

Do you have a question relating to organizing, cleaning, home and office projects, productivity, or any problems you think the Unclutterer team could help you solve? To submit your questions to Ask Unclutterer, go to our contact page and type your question in the content field. Please list the subject of your e-mail as “Ask Unclutterer.” If you feel comfortable sharing images of the spaces that trouble you, let us know about them. The more information we have about your specific issue, the better.

Posted by Erin on Dec 30, 2011 | 18 Comments | Tweet This

Making resolutions and creating a 2012 Resolution Action Plan

According to the National Association of Professional Organizers, the phrase “get organized” is one of the top 10 resolutions people make every year. I’m not really sure how to validate this information, but my guess is that some version of “get organized” falls on the majority of resolution lists (“get the basement organized” or “have better time management”). If you add uncluttering into the “get organized” category, it’s likely a top 5 resolution.

If you fall into the group of resolution makers who wants to be better organized in 2012, the first thing to do is specifically identify why you want to be organized. Being organized isn’t usually a goal. Being organized is merely a path to achieving another goal. For instance, you might want to be better organized with your time after work so you finally get your business idea off the ground. You might want to be more organized with meal planning so you have less stress surrounding mealtimes with your family. Knowing why you want to be organized will help you with the remaining steps of the resolution-making process and with ultimately achieving your goals.

While brainstorming resolutions and the reasons you wish to make your resolutions, keep in mind that change is difficult and that research has found that it is easiest to achieve a goal when you’re only focusing on one at a time. This means you need to have 12 or fewer personal resolutions for 2012, giving yourself at least one month to focus on each resolution. If you have a resolution such as weight loss, and you want to be better organized with your meal planning to help you achieve that resolution, consider making your weight-loss resolution a six month or even an entire year-long resolution. You can focus on each step to help you achieve the weight loss each month — research and doctor’s visit in January, journaling food consumed and daily weight in February, meal planning in March, twice-a-week workouts with a personal trainer in April, four-times-a-week workouts on your own in May, etc.

After you have identified why you want to be more organized and have a rough idea of the resolutions you wish to achieve, your next step is to create a detailed plan of action. This Resolution Action Plan should include very specific language and planning. You need to identify exactly what you want to do in concrete terms and then the exact steps of how you plan to achieve these steps. Create milestones — small goals — for each resolution and rewards you will give to yourself when you reach each milestone.

Similar to last year, I will be taking on 12 monthly resolutions in 2012. Some of the resolutions are organizing and uncluttering related, but most are personal in nature, so I won’t be writing about them the way I did in 2011. I will check in with you over the course of the year, however, to see how you are doing with your resolutions and to provide tips for making and keeping your 2012 Resolution Action Plan. What resolutions do you have on your Plan for 2012? Good luck, and I wish you great resolution success in the coming year.

Posted by Erin on Dec 29, 2011 | 11 Comments | Tweet This

Unclutter stress from your holiday season

With Christmas just a few days away, Hanukkah already in full swing, and New Year’s Eve a little more than a week away, this time of year can be stressful for everyone. A simple trip to the grocery store to buy milk and bread can easily become an hour-long affair as you navigate your way through hordes of turkey buyers. Need a new shirt? The mob at the mall will easily make that trip an anxiety-filled adventure. In addition to all the shoppers, people’s fuses are short and folks are ready for an argument. So much for holiday cheer …

To help keep your stress at bay this time of year, I strongly recommend employing the following three strategies:

Keep perspective. If the present doesn’t arrive until after the holidays, the ornaments aren’t hung on the tree, or the gravy never makes it on the table — you will be okay. In fact, you’ll probably have a funny story to tell for years to come about the year you didn’t serve ham because it was frozen solid and Uncle Jerry broke his knife trying to cut it.
Adopt a mantra. I’m not really one for mantras (especially after watching Annie Hall: “I forgot my mantra!”), but this time of year I’m willing to give any stress-reduction method a try. I like to repeat, “What is really important?” It helps to keep me focused on what matters instead of what doesn’t. Whatever positive saying works for you, use it. Often.
Let it go. You are not a superhero. Perfection is unattainable. Buy a smoked turkey if you’re nervous about cooking the bird. Throw all your clutter into a closet and deal with it after the holidays when you’re more level-headed. Purchase a gift card instead of hunting for the exact gift you think you might discover at the last minute. A happy holiday celebrant is much more enjoyable to be around than someone who is miserable and curt with everyone around him.

Happy holidays from all of us at Unclutterer! We wish you and yours a stress-free and joyful season.

P.S. Check out our 2011 Unclutterer Holiday Gift Giving Guide for ideas if you still have shopping to do. There are many gifts on these lists you can get online and never have to set foot in a store.

Posted by Erin on Dec 22, 2011 | 25 Comments | Tweet This

November resolution wrap up and introduction of December’s goal

November’s resolution was to take one complete day off from work. Until November, I had not taken a full day away from work since August 2008. It wasn’t that I had put in an eight hour workday every day since August 2008, but that I had done at least some kind of work every day — respond to Unclutterer email, delete spam comments from the Forums, check in with a client, make a few edits to my writing.

Working for a lifestyle business has many advantages — I can work from anywhere, have flexible hours if necessary, I was home to witness my son’s first steps and hear his first words, and I’m able to be home to take care of him when he’s sick. Additionally, I get to write and help people and do work that I genuinely love. My work and my personal life are deeply connected, and I like it that way.

The one disadvantage of having a lifestyle business is that if I shut off from work, I directly feel any and all negative repercussions. The most obvious of these are the financial repercussions that can impact my family’s well being (e.g. if I don’t answer a call from a client, the client fires me and hires someone else). Every job has disadvantages, and thankfully the advantages of my job far outweigh the disadvantages, it’s simply difficult to walk away for an entire day.

I eventually was successful at taking a day off from work, but I have to be honest and admit that it wasn’t my intention to take that specific day. I accidentally didn’t charge my cell phone while on vacation and so I was forced to take the day off from work. I also spent the entire day fretting and stressing out about not doing the work I had planned. Had it been done on the day I had planned, I think I would have enjoyed it more than the way it happened.

It is fair to say that although I technically completed my November resolution, the resolution was not a pleasant success. Or, more precisely, I realized I made a resolution I didn’t enjoy achieving. I discerned from this experience that I am a person who is okay with doing a little work every day. This may change in the future and I may grow to be someone who wants more time being disconnected, but right now I’m not that person. I enjoy the peace of mind I get from checking in for a few minutes to make sure the proverbial ship isn’t sinking.

For December, my goal has been to create new resolutions for 2012. I sincerely believe that the one resolution per month system has been the most beneficial resolution-making method for me. I was able to achieve — at least in a technical sense — every resolution I set for myself. I have never had this positive of a success rate in previous years. I can look back on 2011 and know I changed myself for the better.

With 2012 only weeks away, how are you doing with your 2011 resolutions? I hope you have had as positive of an experience as I have enjoyed.

–
Erin’s 2011 monthly resolutions: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, and November.

Posted by Erin on Dec 19, 2011 | 10 Comments | Tweet This

How to preserve photographs worth keeping in three simple steps

Today’s post is written by Sally Jacobs, the Practical Archivist. She has worked on archival collections at the Library of Congress Prints and Photos Division, the Wisconsin Historical Society Archives and American Girl. Thank you, Sally, for agreeing to share your amazing, in-depth knowledge of archival procedures with us.

Before I start talking about preserving heirloom photographs so they last as long as possible, I want to state the obvious: Every photograph in your collection is not an heirloom. In fact, some (most?) of them are photo clutter. If you’re in the process of sorting through your pictures to determine which ones are keepers and which ones aren’t, I recommend checking out the YouTube video I made to help free people from the myth that every print is a treasure. Now, on with the discussion of what to do with the pictures you want to keep …

Ancestor photos are less likely be photo clutter in your home, in part because they are more scarce then modern snapshots. Photography used to be much more expensive than it is today, which means Great Aunt Estelle didn’t have many throwaway shots. Perhaps your collection only includes one portrait of Great Great Uncle Milton — as a soldier or in his wedding suit — but even if it’s just one, you probably want to treat it well. (If you don’t want to keep the old ones, consider passing them along to a genealogist or DeadFred.com.) In addition to these older photographs, you may also have a handful of newer portraits you want to preserve, and this is the best way to keep all of them safe:

Three Simple Things You Can Do to Extend the Life of Your Heirloom Photographs

1. Handle your photos carefully and safely.

Ever wonder why archivists wear white gloves? I use mine so often I wash them and store them in my underwear drawer. Human hands contain oils and salts that can damage photographs, and cotton gloves are an easy barrier to protect photographs. If you’ve seen as many 19th century photos as I have, you’d never forget that a fingerprint that’s invisible today will eventually become an impossible-to-ignore brown stain in the future. White cotton gloves are a simple and inexpensive solution. You can buy them online from suppliers like Uline.com.

If you truly can’t stand to wear gloves while you work on your photographs, I have an alternate suggestion. Wash your hands with soap before you start working, and be sure to wash them again after you take any break. Also, don’t put on hand lotion until you’re finished working with your photos for the day. Other than that, be careful where you place your fingers and try to hold prints by the edges only.

2. Store them in the right spot.

I’ll skip the long boring lecture about temperature and relative humidity and cut to the chase. Like Goldilocks, you want a spot that’s not too hot, not too cold, not too wet, and not too dry. High temperatures speed up the chemical processes that cause damage. Here’s a sobering thought: The rate of decay doubles with each increase of 18ºF. Doubles! High humidity like you find in basements and attics encourages mold and mildew, which can permanently stain and destroy photographs. Fluctuating humidity can cause the photos to crack because the paper backing and the emulsion absorb moisture at different rates. Basements and attics are also at high risk for flooding, and we all know flooding is bad news for any kind of treasure.

So, what’s the right spot? An interior closet in a house that’s cooled in summer and heated in winter is a safe bet. Guest bedrooms and linen closets under stairs work for many of my clients. Under the bed can be a great location, as long as you aren’t putting your photo treasures next to a heating vent.

3. Choose high quality boxes for a longer life

Controlling temperature and humidity levels to a specific zone can be difficult and expensive to accomplish. Fortunately, you can offset what’s going on in a room by putting your photo treasures in archival boxes. This creates a micro-environment that offers protection from UV light damage, dust, and discourages pests. You can even use silica gel to remove excess moisture from the “micro-environment” of your box. Boxing up anything that is loose also protects your photos from folding, crimping, and collecting scratches that happen when a corner of one photo nicks off emulsion from a nearby print.

When I say better boxes, do I mean archival boxes? Well, yes and no…

Yes, in the sense that you want to use the kind of boxes used by professional archivists. But, also no, because the term archival is unregulated and therefore meaningless. Finding a product sold as archival tells you very little about whether it’s a safe environment for your photo treasures. You probably know already that acids will damage paper and photographs. However, a true archival box is both acid free and lignin free. Lignins are a by-product of the paper-making process, and if they aren’t removed they will cause the paper to become acidic over time, even if it’s acid free today.

When it comes to storing photographic prints and film (as opposed to letters and printed material) there is another factor you should consider for your storage materials. The safest boxes for storing photographs have passed the Photographic Activity Test, or PAT. This test is an independent third party test that uses accelerated aging to discover whether the box or envelope will interact with the photographs in any way. You can read more about the PAT in “What Archival Really Means,” an article/rant on my personal blog.

Where can you find PAT-passed materials? Probably not at your neighborhood stationery store or scrapbooking supplier. You can find boxes, envelopes and folders that have passed the PAT in a dizzying array of sizes from archival suppliers such as Gaylord.com, HollingerMetalEdge.com and TalasOnline.com. I also sell an entire kit on my website, if you don’t want to track down individual pieces. (Note from Erin: It’s a nice kit, it’s actually why I asked Sally if she wanted to write a guest post for us. I saw it and thought, “I could really use that.”) If you do right by your photographs, they’ll be around for future generations to enjoy.

And, since this week is Thanksgiving in the U.S., I recommend bringing along copies of your old photos to family gatherings — you can ask relatives to help you identify any unknown people and also enjoy looking at the images.

Posted by Sally on Nov 22, 2011 | 18 Comments | Tweet This

Have vacation brain at work? Try some of these mindless, but productive activities

It’s the Monday before Thanksgiving in the U.S. and if you’re at work, it’s very likely your brain isn’t. Oh look, Sharon from accounting brought in doughnuts! I really should talk about the game/movie I saw this weekend with ALL my coworkers! Now is a great time to make my holiday wish list! Shiny!

On a philosophical level, your employer is paying you to do a job, so you probably should be doing something work related. If you don’t have it in you to focus on creating a viable work product right now, consider doing a little mindless work that supports your work functions:

File. Put on headphones (if they are acceptable in your workplace), and start putting papers away where they belong. If all your papers are filed, review your files to make sure you’re not keeping any information that doesn’t need to be archived. Organize your papers so that they help you do your job.
Review your bulletin board. How recent are all those items hanging on the walls of your cubicle or bulletin board? Can you easily see all of the most vital information? Is the calendar from two years ago? Is there anything that can come down or be replaced?
Clean your phone and work surface. When was the last time you scrubbed either? The dust bunnies behind your monitor aren’t going to clean themselves.
Enter information off business cards. If you’ve recently acquired business cards from important contacts, enter the data into your address book.
Backup your computer. If it’s not done automatically, now is a great time to backup the information off your computer’s hard drive. Be sure to follow your employer’s system for doing this task.
Unclutter your bookshelves. Do you have any out-dated manuals or irrelevant reading materials taking up space on your bookshelves? Now is a great time to recycle, shred, or remove these items from your office.
Equipment check. Are you using all of your equipment in your office? Is it in its best possible shape? Could you benefit more by knowing how to better operate the equipment you do have? Make a request to have the item serviced or take the time to read the operator’s manual or get rid of anything you don’t use.
Restock. Do you need more tape, more pens, more notepads, or any more office supplies? Go “shopping” in the supply closet if you do.

Mindless work often gets a bad reputation as “not working,” but the reality is that you need some down time to let your brain process all that mindful work you are usually doing. Researchers at the University of California, Davis, found that “alternating between mindful work (work that requires intense thought and focus) and mindless work (routine activities that require very little processing power) enhances your efficiency and creativity.” In the end, a little mindless work might actually help you do a better job at producing your mindful work — I call that a win-win.

Posted by Erin on Nov 21, 2011 | 15 Comments | Tweet This

Clean and organize your refrigerator

Tomorrow, November 15, is Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day in the U.S. I’m not really sure who decided to declare such a day, but my guess is a refrigerator manufacturer or food producer had something to do with it. I only know about it because of Hallmark’s Ultimate Holiday Site, which tracks the most absurd holidays. (Case in point, today is National Guacamole and Pickle Day.) Although zany, Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day makes a teensy bit of sense being so close to Thanksgiving — it is a good idea to make room in your refrigerator for all the food that will be needing space in the coming days.

When cleaning out a refrigerator that hasn’t been tended to in many months, I like to tackle it in the following manner:

Gather supplies. Two large trash bags nested one inside the other (food is heavy and a broken bag makes a huge mess) is a must. You’ll also want a bucket with fresh, warm (not hot) water and mild dish detergent with a sponge. Also, a roll of paper towels or a few clean hand towels are good to have with you to dry the shelves when you’re finished wiping them down, especially for the freezer. Finally, I recommend having a notepad and pen handy so you can create a shopping list as you work.
Purge all food past its prime. Working from top to bottom, clear out all food from your refrigerator that is expired, rotten, and not good for eating. If you don’t know if something is edible, check StillTasty.com. If a food is in a jar or bottle and you can’t find its expiration date, visit the company’s website. Many websites have sections where you can enter the item’s bar code and learn its shelf life information.
Wipe it down. Give all the walls and shelves of your refrigerator a firm but gentle scrubbing. Clean up all spills, leaks, and general yuckiness that can dirty up the inside of your refrigerator.
Organize. In addition to putting like items with like items (making it easier to retrieve foods, as well as remembering what items you have), consider employing some advanced organizing techniques. Add stackable, removable shelves or under shelf baskets to better separate items. Use shelf liners to make it easier to clean up future messes and to keep round foods from rolling. If your crisper is where foods go to mold, try removing your drawers so you won’t forget about your produce (if you’re a visual processor, this may really help you). Also, learn what the recommended cooling temperatures for your food are so you know where the best place is inside your refrigerator to store each item.
Clean the containers. Now is a great time to wash all the reusable food containers that may have been ~~hiding~~ storing rotted items.

While you’re working, it’s also nice to inspect the seals on your refrigerator. Are they letting air escape? If they are, you can likely replace them yourself for not very much money or effort. Check your manufacturer’s website for exact information on the replacement seal required for your specific refrigerator model.

If your workplace refrigerator is in need of a good cleaning, you still have time to organize a clean-up project for tomorrow. You may want to add rubber gloves to your list of supplies, though. You never know what science experiments are happening in the back of those shelves.

Random note: November 15 is also Sadie Hawkins Day, so if you are female you can ask a male to help you clean out your refrigerator and celebrate two bizarre holidays at once.

Posted by Erin on Nov 14, 2011 | 42 Comments | Tweet This

Ask Unclutterer: The connection between surroundings and perspective

Reader Tom submitted the following to Ask Unclutterer:

I don’t buy it. I read “Clutter can kill creativity and innovation” and don’t believe a word of it. I can work if my desk is a mess. The “scientific research” is preposterous. I don’t need a minimalist workspace to be creative or innovative. Explain that.

Tom, you don’t need scientific research to prove what you already know to be true: Your surroundings influence the way you work and live, regardless of if you are aware of it or not.

Whenever my office or home are a mess I think about the drive from the Kansas City airport to my hometown to remind myself of how important my environment influences my work, life. It takes a little more than an hour to get from the airport to my mom’s house in Kansas, but the trek is more about transforming one’s perspective than ticking off minutes on a clock. The hectic, metropolitan energy carried through the airport gives way to a raw, rural world as the car travels west along Interstate-70.

Out there, trees are pruned by years of savage winds and spirited rains instead of manufactured gardening tools. Tall grasses wave from their chalky dirt, as if to welcome you to this barren, yet beautiful, golden landscape.

Evidence of man’s presence and dominance of the land appears on the rolling hills with water towers and grain silos every 15 or 20 miles. The smooth highways, road signage, and farm houses are less jarring reminders that people call this place home.

Life in my hometown feels heavier and more exposed than it does in the DC suburbs. You can feel callouses when you shake a person’s hand. People speak honestly and candidly, even to strangers. You can’t be anonymous, rather you have an obligation to carry your burdens and the burdens of your family and neighbors. Life isn’t better or worse or backward or calmer in Kansas — it’s simply different, unprotected. I’m different, less guarded, when I’m there.

When I talk to my Kansas family on the phone from my east coast suburban house with my suburban manicured lawn, I’m not instantly transformed into the person I am when I am there in person. My mind and body know I’m only a few blocks from a Starbucks and a Metro ride away from Congress. My perspective is heavily influenced by the concrete, steel, glass, and seemingly endless river of shopping centers, office buildings, and neighborhoods with their developments’ names carved into stone. To make the anticipated quip, it’s obvious I’m not in Kansas anymore.

If you think your environment doesn’t influence your perspective, imagine the experience of attending a game in a sports stadium. Being at the venue is vastly different than watching the game on your television at home. You’re immersed in the smell of the popcorn from the concession stand, experience the same temperature as the players on the field, and feel the cheers from the crowd.

There are other scientific studies different than the one referenced in “Clutter can kill creativity and innovation” supporting these same conclusions, but you don’t need to read them. You already know that you feel differently walking along a beach on a warm spring day looking out over the ocean than you do waiting in a crowded line at the DMV. An organized, comfortable room easily instills in you a sense of calm and clarity that takes longer to achieve (if at all) in a chaotic space. Without clutter, there are fewer things to distract you from focusing on what is important to you. It might not be impossible to be creative or innovative in a cluttered office — but, it certainly is more difficult. Why make things more difficult than they need to be?

Thank you, Tom, for submitting your question for our Ask Unclutterer column. I hope I was able to provide you with a sufficient response. Be sure to check the comments for even more insight into this issue from our readers.

Posted by Erin on Oct 28, 2011 | 44 Comments | Tweet This

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